


In your light lies salvation

by ca_te



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist
Genre: Angst, M/M, Post Fullmetal Alchemist: Conqueror of Shamballa, Romance, alternate post COS universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-30
Updated: 2013-08-30
Packaged: 2017-12-25 02:39:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/947615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ca_te/pseuds/ca_te
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post COS Au - Parallel universes aren't supposed to collide, separated hearts aren't supposed to touch. Sometimes, though, they can hear each other's call and no time or space barrier is strong enough to keep them apart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In your light lies salvation

**Author's Note:**

> I thought this was going to become an abandoned story, after lying forgotten in my pc for months, but then - mainly thanks to [Tierfal](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Tierfal/pseuds/Tierfal)'s gorgeous fics which are a constant source of inspiration - I decided I would try and this is the result. It has been months since I last posted a FMA ficlet, so comments and reviews are more than welcome and if you want to leave me a prompt you'd make me really happy! You can drop them in my [askbox](http://bluecloudsupabove.tumblr.com/ask) over at Tumblr :)

He was gone, as simple and bone-shattering as that. Ed was no longer part of the world Roy lived in. it was as though all the light had been sucked out, gone like the gold of Ed’s eyes and the brightness of his heart.

Roy found that having lost one eye didn’t matter if the world didn’t have that kind of light in it anymore.

*

It snows, constantly and perpetually, covering everything up in bright white nothing. Where he was born it didn’t snow and he had never seen the snow until he was already a soldier, sent over at Briggs for a whole month of training. He remembers Maes’ laugh echoing through the whiteness after having hit him with a snowball. He stands in front of the hut and looks at the snow, endless and cold, and tries not to imagine what Edward thought the first time he saw it. Did he scoop it up? Did he throw it at Alphonse?

It hurts and it’s cold and Roy’s thoughts keep scattering around like frozen soldiers without a guide.

+++

The sun shines down on the streets, cutting through the icy air, and Edward tilts his head back and stares right at it, forcing his eyes to remain open until black spots cram his vision. Only then he closes them; the bright dots against the blackness of his eyelids always tend to form the same image. He tries not to think about the fact that he keeps staring at the sun only to get to see it, a blurred memory of a face which could never compare to the real one.

Alfons’ hand closes around his, fingertips coarse and palm surprisingly smooth. Ed’s fingers close around his, a reflex which makes guilt stir at the bottom of his stomach. He fucking knows he should try harder, for Alfons and for himself; he knows he is being an asshole.

But it has been two years since the day he opened his eyes and the sky above his head wasn’t the one of Amestris; two years and he still doesn’t get to erase the image of Mustang- _Roy_ \- from where it lodged inside of him, too deep to cut it out.

*

Ed keeps his gaze on Al’s back as he reads; sometimes he still can’t believe that they really managed to get his body back from the gate. Every time his brother laughs, smiles or even frowns it’s like life burns brighter all around. Just like it did when Roy stood too close or looked at him just so, all raven-black eyes and so many things underneath it. Things he hasn’t been brave enough to face when he had the chance. Because Roy meant too much, because what he felt for Roy was too dangerous.

Now that he is stuck here, though, everything keeps coming back to him- prodding at his wounds, clawing at his heart.

“Do you think there’s something wrong with me?”

Al shifts and turns in his chair, his eyebrows furrowed.

“Brother…”

“Don’t give me that tone, Al, you know I…”

He hates the way words get stuck in his throat when he tries to explain what has knotted up inside of him.

“I know.”

Ed blinks, Al’s gaze is gentle on him.

“You don’t have to try so hard, brother, you…”

“Of course I have to, Al. We’re here now and Alfons…”

His fingers grip the bed cover tight. It isn’t enough to make him feel grounded. He never feels like that. Every single waking moment he is nothing more than a balloon floating without aim across the stratosphere.

“Do you think it’s fair, though?”

Ed looks at his hands, both flesh ones now. It still feels weird not to feel the weight of his automail anymore.

“No.”

And he knows it’s the truth. Alfons, sweet kind Alfons, deserves someone better at his side. Someone who can love him. Ed has come to realize that he can’t. Not when all he can think of when Alfons kisses and touches him is Roy. Roy and his ghosts, Roy and his courage, Roy and his pride.

“Why don’t you end it, then?”

As always Al is the voice of reason, the more grounded and wise between them despite everything he has gone through, or maybe thanks to that. But Ed doesn’t like hurting people. He has been hurt too many times, wounds that will never completely heal. Rejecting Alfons when he first made it clear that he wanted something more than friendship from Ed had been something he didn’t have the strength to do.

He knows it was selfish, but he had needed the warmth and the care and the kindness. Sure, Al was there with him, but such big parts of his heart had remained on the other side of the gate. Loneliness was too scary not to hold onto Alfons’s hand.

“I…”

Al stands and comes to sit down beside him on the bed. Automatically Ed’s hand reaches for him, holding onto his arm. He presses his face against the covers and his voice comes out muffled.

“I don’t want to hurt him.”

“But you’re doing it anyway, brother.”

Ed squeezes his eyes shut, wishing he could simply dissolve in the duvet, atoms mixing and thoughts disappearing. He is a fucking idiot, and an asshole at that.

“What can I do?”

Al’s fingers card through his hair, soothing and gentle as their mother’s used to be.

“Talk to him, Ed. And let me help you to find a way out of here.”

The elegant buildings of Central, Riesembol, the long railways cutting through Amestris – images fickle past in Ed’s mind and something tightens almost painfully inside of him. He has always thought that home would be where Al was. It still is like that, just…just he hadn’t planned for his soul to get bound to someone else. His voice cracks slightly when he answers.

“Alright.”

+++

It has been two years and a half since Ed went back to the other side, since the light got sucked out of Roy’s world once again. He is Brigadier General now and the food still tastes like ashes, the light still feels too dull, as though someone up there has switched off the sun. Sometimes Roy thinks Ed took a bit of it with him on the other side of the gate, never to return, never to shine again.

“Brigadier Mustang, sir, the car is here.”

Roy lifts his gaze from the line he has been stuck on for the past half hour and looks at Riza. She hasn’t changed, a sturdy constant he is grateful for in a way words will never be able to express. She worries about him, she always has, and Roy wishes  there was something he could do to assure her that he is fine, that he has learned to cope. But it would be a lie and she would see right through it. He doesn’t want to go back home yet, even though the sun has already set and the night is already stretching over the roofs of Central City. The rooms are too dark and empty; Ed’s ghost is stronger there, the faint traces of his presence still linger in Roy’s bedroom, sweet and painful memories of his moans, of his mismatched limbs around Roy.

“I’ll stay a bit longer. Tell the driver to come back in a hour or two.”

“Sir…”

Roy lowers his gaze, sometimes he doesn’t feel strong enough to deal with her concern for him, not when he isn’t even strong enough to take care of himself against the assault of the grief etched into the very marrow of his bones.

“Lieutenant, please.”

It isn’t a word he uses often and Roy knows all too well that it never fails to have the desired effect.

“As you wish, sir. Just…try to rest a bit.”

Roy nods and stubbornly keeps his gaze focused on his papers until he hears the soft click of the door being closed. Being at the office is safer, even though it doesn’t prevent his traitorous thoughts from wandering back towards Ed. Is he alright? Is he happy? Has he found someone else? Roy knows all too well he shouldn’t wonder, shouldn’t ask these questions that inevitably remain without answer and slip underneath his skin like glass shards, sharp and painful. He can’t help it, though. They call to him, a mermaid song that echoes through his days and his nights.

Before Ed disappeared, Roy had thought they might have the promise of something, despite the blood and the broken hearts and the scars both of them would never be able to erase or to forget. But now he is alone, Ed worlds away, and he can’t help but wonder if it was all a delusion, a trick played by his lonely heart, blinded by the sheer fierceness that Ed was and is.

*

Months snake by and Roy trudges through it all, like they taught him back in his academy days, like war taught him with fire and horror. He goes on like a soldier who marches towards death knowing that he has no other option but walk. He gets better at it, though, he slowly gets back to who he used to be before Ed, before his heart cracked open, love and confusion spilling out and flooding him. Now he is once more able to hide behind a careful constructed mask, his coldness a shield, his flirting with the higher ups a weapon. He knows many say the old Mustang is finally back and look at him with renewed respect as he walks down the halls of Central’s command. It is a relief and a small victory. It doesn’t matter if inside he has never stopped grieving and crumbling – that is only for him to know.

*

Three years without Ed come and go. The fourth peeks around the corner, promise of a life made of silences and broken dreams.

*

“Reports from the borders of the East area, sir.”

There’s something odd to Riza’s tone that Roy can’t pinpoint, but it sets him on edge nonetheless.

“And?”

Riza’s features are set and smooth as always, but her eyes betray her, the shadow of doubt and hope grazing them.

“Bouts of abnormal alchemical activity were detected. They started yesterday night around 3 am and haven’t stopped yet.”

Hope twists inside Roy’s chest and he tries to repress it, to suffocate it before it might grow too much because he is sure he wouldn’t be able to deal with another delusion. It is to no avail, though. As soon as he starts reading the report it is as though a light flickers up to life inside of him and it doesn’t matter how much Roy tries to fan it into submission it just grows stronger.

“Check the train timetable.”

“I already did, sir. The first train to East City departs in half an hour.”

Roy has to use all of his self-restraint not to hug her right there.

+++

Ed is sure is body is coming undone at the seams; he can almost feel his inner organs drifting apart.

“Al!”

His voice sounds broken and he strains to hear his brother  over the roar of blood in his ears.

“I am here, brother. Keep going.”

It is absurdly scary, the thought that this could go so horribly wrong, that they might end up separated once again. But deep down at the bottom of his heart a voice is screaming that this is right, that even though he ends up thorn to pieces it is would be worth trying, because on the other side there’s Roy.

Talking to Alfons hadn’t been easy, just as Ed had imagined. How do you tell someone you can’t love them because your heart belongs to someone else and always will? How do you look them in the eyes and stand the sight of their tears? Emotions have always been hard for Ed to deal with, there aren’t rules like for physics, chemistry or alchemy. Feelings and human hearts are volatile and frail and that never fails to scare the shit out of him. Alfons had listened in silence, azure eyes clouded and guarded. Ed had wanted to reach out, to sooth away the pain that had settled on Alfonse’s gentle features, but he had known that wasn’t his place anymore. He was grateful Alfons had let him go, but he still hated himself for having hurt him so bad with is carelessness.

Taking a deep breath he focuses back on the task at end, his whole body shaking with the effort of fishing up the energy. He is still amazed that he is able to do it at all. In the world behind the gate alchemy isn’t supposed to exist, hell he has tried so many times and to no avail, and yet Al’s researches have proven right. The time and space barrier is definitely thinner here, Amestris closer enough for alchemy to spark softly underneath Ed’s skin. And that has to mean something. That has to be enough.

Underneath Ed’s splayed hands the very matter of the world twist and turns, his bones trembling with the sheer amount of energy that is starting to envelop both him and Al. Ed’s vision breaks at the edges, bright colors cracking like lightning, his body flooded by sensorial memories of a world he has never forgotten.

*

“Fuck!”

Even getting a word out is painful, like shards of glass are rasping down his trachea. Ed forces his eyes open but all that he manages to see are blotches of azure and black, his hands scrambles on sandy soil, seeking Al.

“B-brother?”

Relief washes over Ed despite the pain shooting up and down his body like a scared beast. His vision is still blurred, but he can smell the dust and heat of the Eastern desert, unmistakable and familiar.

+++

Roy runs as though he has fire licking at his heels, as though the world is about to end and crack open underneath his feet. He runs and he doesn’t care if Riza is following, if his very lungs seem to burst. He only stops when he is close enough to Ed to crouch down on the sand and cradle his body close. Out of the corner of his eye he can see Riza and Havoc reaching for Al, but his attention is polarized by Ed’s shallow breaths.

“Who the fuck…”

Ed’s voice is raw and Roy is sure even speaking must hurt him right now.

“Don’t strain yourself, you idiot.”

There’s no bite to his words, they crack all over with affection and Roy is beyond the point of caring about appearances. How could he when Ed is finally here, back where he belongs, in Roy’s arms. He holds his breath as Ed blinks, his shaking fingers coming up to trace the contours of Roy’s eye-patch.

“R-Roy?”

It is hard to speak, emotions nurtured over the years clogging up Roy’s throat.

“Yes, yes I am here.”

And then Ed smiles and four years of hurt and longing evaporate in the golden light of that gaze.

*

Questions wait for an answer, confessions wait to be made, but Roy has been forced to learn that everything has  its own time and now it’s the time to taste and claim and worship the beautiful man breathing underneath him, all pale skin and golden beauty. Ed’s back arches and twist like water, his voice rising and falling like a powerful wind, enveloping Roy until he is floating in a world made of _EdEdEd._

“I…fuck, right there…missed you.”

Roy hides his smile against the taut curve of Ed’s neck, his heart thumping like a war drum as pleasure ripples and breaks inside of him. He can’t find the words and pushes deeper inside of Ed’s lithe body instead, hoping that for now it will be enough. His feelings have grown so vast over the past four years spent in solitude, hopes and dreams piling up, that now they have become a part of him – like his blood and his bones. Being one with Ed feels like coming back home after years spent fighting to survive, bone-weary and heart aching. It feels like gulping down fresh air for the first time. And Roy lets himself go, sinking and soaring at the same time, until Ed cries his name and Roy follows.

*

“I always knew you were alive.”

Ed smacks him, but there’s no force in it, especially considering that he has his golden head pillowed on Roy’s chest.

“Of course I was alive. I don’t die that easily.”

“And I always knew I loved you.”

The words hung over their naked bodies, sharp and soft at the same time, and truer than anything else in Roy’s life.

Ed’s breath draws warm caresses on Roy’s bare skin as he speaks.

“I always knew it too.”

 

_6 years later_

Roy tries to keep his face straight as Ed fumbles with his tie. One would think Windsor knots were perfectly manageable for a twenty five years-old man, but then again Ed has never been in line with normal people’s expectations.  

“Tell me again why I can’t stay at home minding my fucking business?”

Time and a life of coming back home to Roy after hours of lab research  haven’t carved away Ed’s fierceness. Nothing ever will.

“It is only for a few hours.”

Ed throws his hands up, tie hanging askew around his neck.

“Yeah a few hours of being your trophy wife and boring myself to death as you do your thing.”

Roy walks up behind Ed then, smirk in place.

“Would you rather I’d die of boredom all alone?”

Ed glares at him in the mirror, but before he is able to reply Roy slides his fingers down his neck, reaching for the tie and tugs. Whatever Ed was planning on saying dissolves in a half gasp. Roy takes advantage of Ed’s momentarily distraction to swiftly turn the blond around, his fingers loosening the ill-made knot.

“I promise there will be adequate compensation.”

The gold of Ed’s eyes threatens to disappear swallowed by the ink black of his blown pupils.

“T-that’s…I can agree to those terms.”

Roy smiles and tugs the knot in place. Ed surprises him surging forward, his lips brush against Roy’s as he speaks.

“But make sure the compensation is worth it, old man.”

Roy shakes his head and takes Ed’s hand, dragging him out of their bedroom. The weight of Ed’s hand, the texture of his skin is familiar and miraculously new at the same time. Ed doesn’t let go, not even when they are seated in the back of the car. As the streets of Central City roll past outside the windows, Roy thinks about universes colliding, about the light coming back after years of despairing darkness, about how lucky he has been to get a second chance. He squeezes Ed’s hand – _I love you, I’d break down time and space all over again for you_ – Ed simply squeezes back and that’s all Roy will ever need.

 


End file.
